Donald Guter, president and dean of South Texas College of Law
Image: John Everett
South Texas College of Law will receive a $2 million facelift thanks to The Fred and Mabel R. Parks Foundation. The foundation, established by attorney and 1937 alumnus Fred Parks, will pay to fix up classrooms and other improvements.
Those upgrades comprise the second phase of a long-term improvement plan for the downtown Houston law school, according to president and dean Donald Guter. Last month, the school unveiled a remodeled 10th floor of its tower, which now houses the school's clinics.
For nearly two decades, the Texas 1st Court of Appeals and 14th Court of Appeals leased the top three floors of the law school's building pending renovations to a historic courthouse six blocks away, while the clinics operated from a former tire shop nearby. With the courts gone, the clinics moved into the vacant space with two floors to spare, Guter said.
The Parks Foundation grant will pay for two state-of-the-art classrooms on one of those floors and renovate the building's entrance. An open house unveiling the clinic space helped prompt the donation, Guter said.
"I thought we wouldn't be starting another project for a year or two, but this gift helps us move much sooner. It creates a lot of excitement in the school," he said. "We're making sure to do all this work without borrowing and without adding any money to the tuition stream."
An earlier multimillion-dollar donation by the foundation paid for construction of the school's six-floor library. Additionally, it has supported scholarships and professorships.
The renovations are slated to begin in the spring.
Contact Karen Sloan at ksloan@alm.com.
